SWIRLING CLOUDS IN VIOLET HAZE
He'd never asked to be so small. He'd never asked for such a tiny voice. He'd never been so fed up with being stepped on. Today was the day Walter O'Reilly's heart had been broken once again.
Radar stood in the procedure room, a supposed helping hand when a sudden wave of casualties swept over the 4077th. He sat and stewed silently in his own darkness. He struggled to stay awake, loathing the graveyard shift more with every second that passed.
"Radar... Radar... RADAR!" Hawkeye wasn't partial to hollering at the little guy, but a procedure was a procedure and the patient wouldn't live if he didn't pay attention. Overstatement. Everyone was exhausted, and with his cooperation they could all get done faster.
"What, Hawkeye! What! Aww, geez! You scared me to death!" He scolded
"For a corpse, you certainly look pink. Pass me a scalpel."
Obediently, he passed Hawkeye the dangerously sharp object; the thought to put it through his palm passed his mind, scaring him. "What do you need a scalpel for? This is just a delivery." He asked, shaking it off.
"I need to make an episiotomy. If I don't cut this, it will tear and cause infection. I may have to prep her for cesarean section if she doesn't deliver in an hour." Hawkeye continued not yet knowing that Radar had wandered off, lost again in his thoughts.
~***~
Later on in the mess tent, Radar sat by himself. Lonely Sergeant Walter O'Reilly. Normally any upset would have unconsciously instructed him to pile his tray high with whatever food would momentarily ease his pain, but the abnormally strong feeling that he wouldn't have been able to keep it down, kept his palate clean. He sat in a secluded corner of the tent. It was one that nobody enjoyed sitting at because not only did the east wind sometimes carry the scent of fresh blood to this corner, it also carried the sound of disembodied gunshots.
He stared blankly at the canvas walls, ignoring everyone around him. When tears finally dared drop from his sad eyes, he stood up abruptly, almost knocking over the table, then ran from the mess tent with a very haunting wail.
"I have never seen him like that!" Margaret exclaimed to herself. She knew there was something extremely wrong, and it was her instinct to run after.
She ran out of the mess tent, into the Colonel's office and finally into Radar's bunk where he... wasn't. She ran back outside and drew in a large breath. "Radar?!" She projected. Her voice echoed into the blue night sky, the fear of a snipers bullet to the back of the head had been numbed.
She passed the swamp in her mad scramble for Sergeant O'Reilly, waking BJ and Hawkeye.
"Houlihan? Do you know what time of night this is?" Hawkeye complained.
"Did you see Radar pass by? You had to have heard him scream."
"Is that what that was?" BJ chimed in, beginning to awaken.
After a few seconds and a good strong martini, Hawkeye and BJ had joined in their search for the missing youth.
~***~
"Whoa, whoa, whoa young man." Colonel Potter said, grasping his upper arm and nearly tipping over the both of them. He had been inside the supply tent, doing inventory while Radar took a break. He had finished just as Radar sped by. "Got somewhere to go?" He asked kindly.
Before Radar could respond, Margaret wrapped her arms around him in a huge restraint, though it was more of a relieved hug. His emotions swelled to a point he couldn't stand, and he collapsed. Margaret herself was at that point. She helped him gently to the ground, keeping her thighs under the back of his head.
"Wake up Radar." Margaret insisted, shakily. "Damn you, open your eyes!" She removed his glasses and set them aside, noticing for the first time that he had such a baby face.
"What's going on here?!?" Potter asked softly.
"It started in the procedures room, Sir. Radar walked out while he was helping me prep a young woman for childbirth." Hawkeye began.
"Right, and then when he was in the mess tent a little while ago he started wailing like a banshee and stormed out." Margaret added.
Whilst the two explained Radar's odd behavior to the Colonel, BJ pried open Radar's eyes. Everything seemed all right until he spotted something. It was nothing physical, but even in an unconscious state Radar's eyes said everything.
"Something really strange is happening to the poor kid. Get him in his bunk, make sure to remove everything from his bunk but his bed, got it?"
"Even his bear?" Margaret said, on the verge of tears
"I'm sorry." BJ said, meaning yes. "For his own protection I think he might need to be restrained."
~***~
BJ and Hawkeye sat in the swamp, trying to decipher the reality of the situation from the drama. Margaret provided the drama; of that there was no doubt.
"Hawk, do you remember telling me that for a split second Radar looked like he was going to kill you?"
"Yeah. Why?" He said, sipping yet another martini.
"Have you two had a confrontation?"
"No, but I did have to holler at him to get him to pass me a scalpel."
BJ cocked his head to the side in thought. " Why'd you have to do that?"
"He was in his own little world. I honestly think he didn't hear me until I was at a full-scale yell."
"Hmm." BJ answered. "I think I might know what's wrong with him."
"What?"
"I think Radar might have had a nervous breakdown."...
Colonel Potter sat at Radar's bedside all night, keeping quiet vigil while the Kindly Father Mulcahy prayed over his still frame.
"Father. I think he's fighting a demon even prayer won't cast out."
"It may seem that way right now, Sir, but you never want to give up faith. Things aren't always what they seem. You get some sleep and I will watch over him." He offered sagely.
"I'm afraid I have an obligation to the young man. I feel I may have worked him too hard." Potter lowered his head in shame.
"Radar is a hard worker whether someone is working him or not. He is simply serving his country by serving his superior. It isn't your fault."
He gingerly squeezed the colonel's shoulder and added: "The lord gives orders much like you, and if I understand his way, he orders you to sleep. In a word, Colonel, a watched pot never boils."
"Thanks Francis." Potter sighed as he trudged on to bed.
"Oh, hello there." Father Mulcahy said as he watched Radar open his eyes.
"Where'd all my stuff go?" He began sleepily. As he motioned to reach for his glasses to see who was in the room with him, he realized the task couldn't be completed. "Hey! What's the big idea?" he began to raise his voice. Potter emerged from his room as though he were spooked out.
Radar pulled madly at his restraints in an effort to break himself loose. His chest heaved with frightened breaths.
"Sergeant O'Reilly, calm down! And that's an order!"
"I refuse to obey someone I can't see!" He shot back furiously. Radar had never once been furious with anyone.
Father Mulcahy gently slipped Radar's glasses on his face. Within seconds, his vision cleared. "Oh, Colonel Potter, Sir, I'm so sorry, please accept my most sincere apology." He stammered. It seemed as though he was weakening.
"Father, can you call Larry, Moe and Margaret in here, please?"
"Yes sir, right away, sir."
~***~
"Hawkeye, BJ, you are needed in the Colonel's quarters. Margaret is already there. It appears as though Radar has come back to us. However appearances can be deceiving."
"What do you mean by that?" Hawkeye asked somewhat defensively.
"I mean that when Colonel Potter said that even prayer couldn't cast out Radar's demon, he may have been right."
"This sounds terrible." BJ sighed sadly.
All three men walked to the office in silence. A few people stood around the Colonel's office, and soon they found out why.
"What's going on, Max?" BJ asked Corporal Klinger.
He pulled at his snood and said: "Have a listen."
Everyone quieted and strained to listen as the next string of events occurred.
"Radar, It will be alright. Just sit there until Hawkeye and BJ get here and check you out." Potter reasoned.
"I WANT UP!" Radar wailed. His eyes were wild, full of tears and rage that even he couldn't control. He struggled and thrashed to try and free himself until his energy to was no more. Margaret wiped the sweat away from his fevered brow and whispered to him that all was well. He calmed, and ultimately fell asleep.
The nurses were all brushing away their own tears, shocked at hearing the poor kid's angst.
"Why is he being held down?" Klinger whispered.
"We don't even know yet..." Hawkeye's words were cut short; as yet another fit broke loose.
"Alright, we need through before he hurts someone." Father Mulcahy insisted.
"Before he hurts someone?" The whole crowd gasped at once.
"Move it!" BJ barked as they shoved through.
"What the hell happened?" Hawkeye cried out when confronted with an ever-widening scarlet pool on Radar's pillow.
"He went into another fit and he hit his head on one of the studs there." Potter pointed out. He held a kerchief to the back of the young man's head, but the bleeding was severe enough that the kerchief alone wouldn't help to stop it.
Mulcahy was once again in vigil, projecting his prayer from his side of the bunk to Radar's afraid to look at the damage something sinister had done. If there was one thing he knew it was that Radar wasn't capable of such destruction.
"Why is he so quiet? He's awake." Margaret asked.
"He must have really hurt himself. Damn." BJ thought aloud.
"Naw." Potter contradicted, "He's got a hard head. He'll talk when he's ready."
"We're going to have to stitch that up," Hawkeye interrupted, "We had better get him in to the procedure room."
Margaret ran ahead and prepped a table and some instruments while Hawkeye and Potter cleaned up the open gash as best they could before they took him through the crowd. They both helped Radar into BJ's arms; it looked as though he were carrying a dying child. That about measured it. Granted, Radar was 18, but he wasn't an adult yet.
"I'm sorry BJ." He whimpered.
"Shh. I know. Just keep quiet. You'll feel better in no time."
As BJ carried him through the crowd, he heard an almost simultaneous "Oh poor baby."
BJ could have sworn that had he been looking any harder at Radar, he would have seen a smile, but the sad fact was that his strong feelings for the kid were playing tricks on him.
After what seemed like a world of onlookers and people in ridiculously mature mourning, they finally got him to the room. He fell more limp as weaker and more ill he became.
"Margaret!" He cried, disoriented. She rushed to his side and took his icy cold hands in her own; in the meantime they stopped hers from trembling.
"I'm right here honey." She wanted to force back her upset, but each time she looked at him, suffering at the point where she couldn't reach to bring him back down, she felt insignificant and thus her tears began to flow.
"Please don't let me die..." In and out he faded. His voice was almost inaudible.
"You aren't dying sweetheart, you are just stuck in a really bad place."
"That blood vessel is crushed. Y'know, I have never seen so much blood come from a contusion this size." BJ complained.
"Let's just get him fixed, hmm?" Potter suggested. Before Radar knew what was happening, he was under, and then he was done.
~***~
"...Starry, starry night, flaming flow'rs that brightly blaze, Swirling clouds in violet haze, reflect in Vincent's eyes that shine of blue," He recited in his sleep, "Colors changing hue, mourning fields of amber grain, weathered faces lined in pain, are soothed beneath the artists loving hand...."
"Oh my god... Hawkeye, listen to this... it's so beautiful..." Margaret whispered in amazement.
"Now I understand what you tried to say to me, and how you suffered for your sanity, and how you tried to set them free. They would not listen, they did not know how. Perhaps they'll listen now.
"For they could not love you, and still your love was true. And when no hope was left in sight on that starry, starry night, you took your life as lovers often do. But I could have told you Vincent, this world was never meant for one as beautiful as you..."
"That's remarkable..." Father Mulcahy whispered behind the eavesdropping two. "If I'm not mistaken, he is referring to Vincent VanGogh, who took his life for the sake of love lost."
"THAT'S...That's it..." Margaret almost shouted.
"What?!" Hawkeye snipped, yanked mercilessly from the beauty of the poetry.
"Go in his bunk. If you look in the inside pocket of his jacket you'll find a 45 record. I want you to play it." Margaret swallowed hard. If there was anyone she wanted to avoid crying in front of it was definitely Hawkeye. *Damn the fact that I care.* she thought. "It's from his fiancée."
"Starry, starry night, portraits hung in empty halls, frameless heads on nameless walls with eyes that watch the world and can't forget, like the strangers that you've met, the ragged men in ragged clothes,
"A silver thorn, a bloody rose, lie crushed and broken on the virgin snow..."
Oddly, after his words ceased, so did his sleep. His eyes fluttered open and all in the room vowed to keep Radar's poetry to themselves. Before he would be able to tell the difference, Hawkeye and BJ slipped out of Post-op and into Radar's bunk.
"Good afternoon, Radar." Col. Potter greeted quietly. Radar smiled and looked around post-op.
"What are you looking for son?"
"Bear." He simply replied. He stretched and gingerly sat up, testing his boundaries, which frankly weren't that spacious. He stayed sitting up long enough to reach for his glasses. He caught a quick glimpse of himself in the back of a stainless steel patient stats clipboard hanging off the frame of an empty bed across the way.
His head was wrapped tightly in a pressure dressing. From the blunt trauma, his body had already begun reacting, producing two prominent black eyes. He smiled again, however wanly as Margaret handed him his bear. At the mere sight of his plush best friend, he forgot completely about his less than perfect appearance.
"Thank you ma'am." He politely addressed. Everyone in the room heaved a sigh of relief at hearing the smile in his voice.
"Radar, is there something you need to talk to us about?" Hawkeye asked, concerned as he and BJ returned to post-op.
"Huh?" Radar replied, genuinely confused.
Without another word, BJ pulled the record from beneath his jacket. Radar's eyes dimmed profoundly.
"I think you should speak up, son." Potter kindly suggested.
"Did you hear her break my heart?" Radar began, tears brimming his voice, almost drowning it. "A letter would have sufficed. I wouldn't have had to hear my best friend and my girl falling in love in a letter. I could have settled for a simple good-bye, guys." He had to stop, his blood pressure was rising, and he began to soak the dressing.
"Keep your cool, honey." Margaret offered as she added more gauze to the dressing. Blood began to quickly soak through the new dressing as well. He was beginning to cry; all worked up because the doctors may have sewed up his scalp, but they had just destroyed his (barely rebuilding) broken heart all over again. "Damn it, Radar. I know it hurts, I know. But this will kill you quicker than a broken heart, so cool it."
"Margaret, give him a break. At least you got a letter. It may not have been meant for you, but you didn't have to hear it happen." Potter defended Radar. He felt the old paternal instinct kick in, and Radar must have felt it too because he began to calm, slowly but surely.
"Had you confided in at least Colonel Potter, this could have been avoided, Sergeant." BJ explained, disappointed.
"How the hell would any of you understand? You are married, BJ. Peggy loves you! Hawkeye, you are comfortable in your loveless state! Margaret, you are the only one who might just realize how I feel! And yet I highly doubt it because you are all self-absorbed." He said at the top of his voice.
He began to tremble, enough to alert the doctor in all present, and definitely enough to frighten Radar.
"I think I know what to do," Father Mulcahy said, emerging from his prayer, slightly drowsy, "BJ, Hawkeye, Potter, sirs, I am going to have to ask you to leave the room. Keep close, though. Margaret, I need you to prepare yourself with something to stop the bleeding."
"What are you going to do?" Margaret asked, somewhat unnerved.
"Forgive me, I think he needs very badly to cry and get it out."
"Only the saintly know what to do in these times." Margaret said in admiration. "Okay, let's go."
"Radar, my son, I have noticed your strange behavior lately. We are all worried to tears over you. I am surprised at your lack of gratitude." Father Mulcahy began. He made sure to keep a prayer running through his mind to keep his emotions at bay.
"My lack of gratitude?!" He began, upsetting once again. The monster was beginning to stir.
"Did you even hear yourself, or take to heart the terrible position you put those three honorable men in?"
"Why is it just my behavior that's to blame? My heart has been trampled more times than I care to acknowledge, and around this crapshoot, when I try to find companionship, just someone to talk to," His voice broke, his eyes brimmed with tears, "I'm rejected because I don't look like BJ or Hawkeye. Even Klinger has a girl."
"I heard that!" Klinger shouted from outside.
"Pipe it, Klinger!" Margaret hissed. She looked at the tears that streaked down Radar's face and began to relax. "It's working." She mouthed. After a few seconds, the bleeding became light, and then it stopped. Even a slight look of relief came over Radar's pale demeanor.
"If it's the nurses you want, I can tell you that you are looking in the wrong place. They are all too self-involved to notice your potential." Margaret offered. "I didn't notice what a baby-face you had until you passed out in my arms yesterday evening. I didn't realize that when you were sad, your eyes looked like white-framed emeralds. Nobody looks because everyone is too wrapped up in themselves."
"But you have Frank."
"Honey, I gave up on him when he transferred. And anyway, I only hung around him because I felt kinda sorry for him."
As soon as she saw a slight smile, she added: "The boys don't call him Ferret Face for nothing." It felt nice to put that out in the open.
Hawkeye poked his head into post-op and grinned that mischievous grin of his. "How's everything going?"
"It's going along very smoothly." Father Mulcahy remarked. He silently thanked whoever would hear him for such straight- forward guidance.
"How are you feeling?" Margaret asked.
"Like a human being." He said in short hiccups, still in tears. He didn't intend to stop until he felt complete relief.
~***~
Back in Iowa:
A homely young woman ventured outside her home to check her mail and came across a manila envelope with no return address. She knew well enough that it was from Walter, judging from the handwriting on the main address.
She shook her head, expecting to open the envelope and find a letter begging her to reconsider, or some jewelry to try and win her back. She went back inside after collecting the rest of the mail. She sat in her and Walter's old favorite cuddling place, now meant for her and her new love.
She opened the envelope and turned it upside down, letting its contents slip out onto her lap. To her surprise, there laid a 45 record broken in two, and a picture of Radar in his formal uniform, in the arms of a beautiful blonde. She flipped the picture over to find simply inscribed: Goodbye.
THE END
He'd never asked to be so small. He'd never asked for such a tiny voice. He'd never been so fed up with being stepped on. Today was the day Walter O'Reilly's heart had been broken once again.
Radar stood in the procedure room, a supposed helping hand when a sudden wave of casualties swept over the 4077th. He sat and stewed silently in his own darkness. He struggled to stay awake, loathing the graveyard shift more with every second that passed.
"Radar... Radar... RADAR!" Hawkeye wasn't partial to hollering at the little guy, but a procedure was a procedure and the patient wouldn't live if he didn't pay attention. Overstatement. Everyone was exhausted, and with his cooperation they could all get done faster.
"What, Hawkeye! What! Aww, geez! You scared me to death!" He scolded
"For a corpse, you certainly look pink. Pass me a scalpel."
Obediently, he passed Hawkeye the dangerously sharp object; the thought to put it through his palm passed his mind, scaring him. "What do you need a scalpel for? This is just a delivery." He asked, shaking it off.
"I need to make an episiotomy. If I don't cut this, it will tear and cause infection. I may have to prep her for cesarean section if she doesn't deliver in an hour." Hawkeye continued not yet knowing that Radar had wandered off, lost again in his thoughts.
~***~
Later on in the mess tent, Radar sat by himself. Lonely Sergeant Walter O'Reilly. Normally any upset would have unconsciously instructed him to pile his tray high with whatever food would momentarily ease his pain, but the abnormally strong feeling that he wouldn't have been able to keep it down, kept his palate clean. He sat in a secluded corner of the tent. It was one that nobody enjoyed sitting at because not only did the east wind sometimes carry the scent of fresh blood to this corner, it also carried the sound of disembodied gunshots.
He stared blankly at the canvas walls, ignoring everyone around him. When tears finally dared drop from his sad eyes, he stood up abruptly, almost knocking over the table, then ran from the mess tent with a very haunting wail.
"I have never seen him like that!" Margaret exclaimed to herself. She knew there was something extremely wrong, and it was her instinct to run after.
She ran out of the mess tent, into the Colonel's office and finally into Radar's bunk where he... wasn't. She ran back outside and drew in a large breath. "Radar?!" She projected. Her voice echoed into the blue night sky, the fear of a snipers bullet to the back of the head had been numbed.
She passed the swamp in her mad scramble for Sergeant O'Reilly, waking BJ and Hawkeye.
"Houlihan? Do you know what time of night this is?" Hawkeye complained.
"Did you see Radar pass by? You had to have heard him scream."
"Is that what that was?" BJ chimed in, beginning to awaken.
After a few seconds and a good strong martini, Hawkeye and BJ had joined in their search for the missing youth.
~***~
"Whoa, whoa, whoa young man." Colonel Potter said, grasping his upper arm and nearly tipping over the both of them. He had been inside the supply tent, doing inventory while Radar took a break. He had finished just as Radar sped by. "Got somewhere to go?" He asked kindly.
Before Radar could respond, Margaret wrapped her arms around him in a huge restraint, though it was more of a relieved hug. His emotions swelled to a point he couldn't stand, and he collapsed. Margaret herself was at that point. She helped him gently to the ground, keeping her thighs under the back of his head.
"Wake up Radar." Margaret insisted, shakily. "Damn you, open your eyes!" She removed his glasses and set them aside, noticing for the first time that he had such a baby face.
"What's going on here?!?" Potter asked softly.
"It started in the procedures room, Sir. Radar walked out while he was helping me prep a young woman for childbirth." Hawkeye began.
"Right, and then when he was in the mess tent a little while ago he started wailing like a banshee and stormed out." Margaret added.
Whilst the two explained Radar's odd behavior to the Colonel, BJ pried open Radar's eyes. Everything seemed all right until he spotted something. It was nothing physical, but even in an unconscious state Radar's eyes said everything.
"Something really strange is happening to the poor kid. Get him in his bunk, make sure to remove everything from his bunk but his bed, got it?"
"Even his bear?" Margaret said, on the verge of tears
"I'm sorry." BJ said, meaning yes. "For his own protection I think he might need to be restrained."
~***~
BJ and Hawkeye sat in the swamp, trying to decipher the reality of the situation from the drama. Margaret provided the drama; of that there was no doubt.
"Hawk, do you remember telling me that for a split second Radar looked like he was going to kill you?"
"Yeah. Why?" He said, sipping yet another martini.
"Have you two had a confrontation?"
"No, but I did have to holler at him to get him to pass me a scalpel."
BJ cocked his head to the side in thought. " Why'd you have to do that?"
"He was in his own little world. I honestly think he didn't hear me until I was at a full-scale yell."
"Hmm." BJ answered. "I think I might know what's wrong with him."
"What?"
"I think Radar might have had a nervous breakdown."...
Colonel Potter sat at Radar's bedside all night, keeping quiet vigil while the Kindly Father Mulcahy prayed over his still frame.
"Father. I think he's fighting a demon even prayer won't cast out."
"It may seem that way right now, Sir, but you never want to give up faith. Things aren't always what they seem. You get some sleep and I will watch over him." He offered sagely.
"I'm afraid I have an obligation to the young man. I feel I may have worked him too hard." Potter lowered his head in shame.
"Radar is a hard worker whether someone is working him or not. He is simply serving his country by serving his superior. It isn't your fault."
He gingerly squeezed the colonel's shoulder and added: "The lord gives orders much like you, and if I understand his way, he orders you to sleep. In a word, Colonel, a watched pot never boils."
"Thanks Francis." Potter sighed as he trudged on to bed.
"Oh, hello there." Father Mulcahy said as he watched Radar open his eyes.
"Where'd all my stuff go?" He began sleepily. As he motioned to reach for his glasses to see who was in the room with him, he realized the task couldn't be completed. "Hey! What's the big idea?" he began to raise his voice. Potter emerged from his room as though he were spooked out.
Radar pulled madly at his restraints in an effort to break himself loose. His chest heaved with frightened breaths.
"Sergeant O'Reilly, calm down! And that's an order!"
"I refuse to obey someone I can't see!" He shot back furiously. Radar had never once been furious with anyone.
Father Mulcahy gently slipped Radar's glasses on his face. Within seconds, his vision cleared. "Oh, Colonel Potter, Sir, I'm so sorry, please accept my most sincere apology." He stammered. It seemed as though he was weakening.
"Father, can you call Larry, Moe and Margaret in here, please?"
"Yes sir, right away, sir."
~***~
"Hawkeye, BJ, you are needed in the Colonel's quarters. Margaret is already there. It appears as though Radar has come back to us. However appearances can be deceiving."
"What do you mean by that?" Hawkeye asked somewhat defensively.
"I mean that when Colonel Potter said that even prayer couldn't cast out Radar's demon, he may have been right."
"This sounds terrible." BJ sighed sadly.
All three men walked to the office in silence. A few people stood around the Colonel's office, and soon they found out why.
"What's going on, Max?" BJ asked Corporal Klinger.
He pulled at his snood and said: "Have a listen."
Everyone quieted and strained to listen as the next string of events occurred.
"Radar, It will be alright. Just sit there until Hawkeye and BJ get here and check you out." Potter reasoned.
"I WANT UP!" Radar wailed. His eyes were wild, full of tears and rage that even he couldn't control. He struggled and thrashed to try and free himself until his energy to was no more. Margaret wiped the sweat away from his fevered brow and whispered to him that all was well. He calmed, and ultimately fell asleep.
The nurses were all brushing away their own tears, shocked at hearing the poor kid's angst.
"Why is he being held down?" Klinger whispered.
"We don't even know yet..." Hawkeye's words were cut short; as yet another fit broke loose.
"Alright, we need through before he hurts someone." Father Mulcahy insisted.
"Before he hurts someone?" The whole crowd gasped at once.
"Move it!" BJ barked as they shoved through.
"What the hell happened?" Hawkeye cried out when confronted with an ever-widening scarlet pool on Radar's pillow.
"He went into another fit and he hit his head on one of the studs there." Potter pointed out. He held a kerchief to the back of the young man's head, but the bleeding was severe enough that the kerchief alone wouldn't help to stop it.
Mulcahy was once again in vigil, projecting his prayer from his side of the bunk to Radar's afraid to look at the damage something sinister had done. If there was one thing he knew it was that Radar wasn't capable of such destruction.
"Why is he so quiet? He's awake." Margaret asked.
"He must have really hurt himself. Damn." BJ thought aloud.
"Naw." Potter contradicted, "He's got a hard head. He'll talk when he's ready."
"We're going to have to stitch that up," Hawkeye interrupted, "We had better get him in to the procedure room."
Margaret ran ahead and prepped a table and some instruments while Hawkeye and Potter cleaned up the open gash as best they could before they took him through the crowd. They both helped Radar into BJ's arms; it looked as though he were carrying a dying child. That about measured it. Granted, Radar was 18, but he wasn't an adult yet.
"I'm sorry BJ." He whimpered.
"Shh. I know. Just keep quiet. You'll feel better in no time."
As BJ carried him through the crowd, he heard an almost simultaneous "Oh poor baby."
BJ could have sworn that had he been looking any harder at Radar, he would have seen a smile, but the sad fact was that his strong feelings for the kid were playing tricks on him.
After what seemed like a world of onlookers and people in ridiculously mature mourning, they finally got him to the room. He fell more limp as weaker and more ill he became.
"Margaret!" He cried, disoriented. She rushed to his side and took his icy cold hands in her own; in the meantime they stopped hers from trembling.
"I'm right here honey." She wanted to force back her upset, but each time she looked at him, suffering at the point where she couldn't reach to bring him back down, she felt insignificant and thus her tears began to flow.
"Please don't let me die..." In and out he faded. His voice was almost inaudible.
"You aren't dying sweetheart, you are just stuck in a really bad place."
"That blood vessel is crushed. Y'know, I have never seen so much blood come from a contusion this size." BJ complained.
"Let's just get him fixed, hmm?" Potter suggested. Before Radar knew what was happening, he was under, and then he was done.
~***~
"...Starry, starry night, flaming flow'rs that brightly blaze, Swirling clouds in violet haze, reflect in Vincent's eyes that shine of blue," He recited in his sleep, "Colors changing hue, mourning fields of amber grain, weathered faces lined in pain, are soothed beneath the artists loving hand...."
"Oh my god... Hawkeye, listen to this... it's so beautiful..." Margaret whispered in amazement.
"Now I understand what you tried to say to me, and how you suffered for your sanity, and how you tried to set them free. They would not listen, they did not know how. Perhaps they'll listen now.
"For they could not love you, and still your love was true. And when no hope was left in sight on that starry, starry night, you took your life as lovers often do. But I could have told you Vincent, this world was never meant for one as beautiful as you..."
"That's remarkable..." Father Mulcahy whispered behind the eavesdropping two. "If I'm not mistaken, he is referring to Vincent VanGogh, who took his life for the sake of love lost."
"THAT'S...That's it..." Margaret almost shouted.
"What?!" Hawkeye snipped, yanked mercilessly from the beauty of the poetry.
"Go in his bunk. If you look in the inside pocket of his jacket you'll find a 45 record. I want you to play it." Margaret swallowed hard. If there was anyone she wanted to avoid crying in front of it was definitely Hawkeye. *Damn the fact that I care.* she thought. "It's from his fiancée."
"Starry, starry night, portraits hung in empty halls, frameless heads on nameless walls with eyes that watch the world and can't forget, like the strangers that you've met, the ragged men in ragged clothes,
"A silver thorn, a bloody rose, lie crushed and broken on the virgin snow..."
Oddly, after his words ceased, so did his sleep. His eyes fluttered open and all in the room vowed to keep Radar's poetry to themselves. Before he would be able to tell the difference, Hawkeye and BJ slipped out of Post-op and into Radar's bunk.
"Good afternoon, Radar." Col. Potter greeted quietly. Radar smiled and looked around post-op.
"What are you looking for son?"
"Bear." He simply replied. He stretched and gingerly sat up, testing his boundaries, which frankly weren't that spacious. He stayed sitting up long enough to reach for his glasses. He caught a quick glimpse of himself in the back of a stainless steel patient stats clipboard hanging off the frame of an empty bed across the way.
His head was wrapped tightly in a pressure dressing. From the blunt trauma, his body had already begun reacting, producing two prominent black eyes. He smiled again, however wanly as Margaret handed him his bear. At the mere sight of his plush best friend, he forgot completely about his less than perfect appearance.
"Thank you ma'am." He politely addressed. Everyone in the room heaved a sigh of relief at hearing the smile in his voice.
"Radar, is there something you need to talk to us about?" Hawkeye asked, concerned as he and BJ returned to post-op.
"Huh?" Radar replied, genuinely confused.
Without another word, BJ pulled the record from beneath his jacket. Radar's eyes dimmed profoundly.
"I think you should speak up, son." Potter kindly suggested.
"Did you hear her break my heart?" Radar began, tears brimming his voice, almost drowning it. "A letter would have sufficed. I wouldn't have had to hear my best friend and my girl falling in love in a letter. I could have settled for a simple good-bye, guys." He had to stop, his blood pressure was rising, and he began to soak the dressing.
"Keep your cool, honey." Margaret offered as she added more gauze to the dressing. Blood began to quickly soak through the new dressing as well. He was beginning to cry; all worked up because the doctors may have sewed up his scalp, but they had just destroyed his (barely rebuilding) broken heart all over again. "Damn it, Radar. I know it hurts, I know. But this will kill you quicker than a broken heart, so cool it."
"Margaret, give him a break. At least you got a letter. It may not have been meant for you, but you didn't have to hear it happen." Potter defended Radar. He felt the old paternal instinct kick in, and Radar must have felt it too because he began to calm, slowly but surely.
"Had you confided in at least Colonel Potter, this could have been avoided, Sergeant." BJ explained, disappointed.
"How the hell would any of you understand? You are married, BJ. Peggy loves you! Hawkeye, you are comfortable in your loveless state! Margaret, you are the only one who might just realize how I feel! And yet I highly doubt it because you are all self-absorbed." He said at the top of his voice.
He began to tremble, enough to alert the doctor in all present, and definitely enough to frighten Radar.
"I think I know what to do," Father Mulcahy said, emerging from his prayer, slightly drowsy, "BJ, Hawkeye, Potter, sirs, I am going to have to ask you to leave the room. Keep close, though. Margaret, I need you to prepare yourself with something to stop the bleeding."
"What are you going to do?" Margaret asked, somewhat unnerved.
"Forgive me, I think he needs very badly to cry and get it out."
"Only the saintly know what to do in these times." Margaret said in admiration. "Okay, let's go."
"Radar, my son, I have noticed your strange behavior lately. We are all worried to tears over you. I am surprised at your lack of gratitude." Father Mulcahy began. He made sure to keep a prayer running through his mind to keep his emotions at bay.
"My lack of gratitude?!" He began, upsetting once again. The monster was beginning to stir.
"Did you even hear yourself, or take to heart the terrible position you put those three honorable men in?"
"Why is it just my behavior that's to blame? My heart has been trampled more times than I care to acknowledge, and around this crapshoot, when I try to find companionship, just someone to talk to," His voice broke, his eyes brimmed with tears, "I'm rejected because I don't look like BJ or Hawkeye. Even Klinger has a girl."
"I heard that!" Klinger shouted from outside.
"Pipe it, Klinger!" Margaret hissed. She looked at the tears that streaked down Radar's face and began to relax. "It's working." She mouthed. After a few seconds, the bleeding became light, and then it stopped. Even a slight look of relief came over Radar's pale demeanor.
"If it's the nurses you want, I can tell you that you are looking in the wrong place. They are all too self-involved to notice your potential." Margaret offered. "I didn't notice what a baby-face you had until you passed out in my arms yesterday evening. I didn't realize that when you were sad, your eyes looked like white-framed emeralds. Nobody looks because everyone is too wrapped up in themselves."
"But you have Frank."
"Honey, I gave up on him when he transferred. And anyway, I only hung around him because I felt kinda sorry for him."
As soon as she saw a slight smile, she added: "The boys don't call him Ferret Face for nothing." It felt nice to put that out in the open.
Hawkeye poked his head into post-op and grinned that mischievous grin of his. "How's everything going?"
"It's going along very smoothly." Father Mulcahy remarked. He silently thanked whoever would hear him for such straight- forward guidance.
"How are you feeling?" Margaret asked.
"Like a human being." He said in short hiccups, still in tears. He didn't intend to stop until he felt complete relief.
~***~
Back in Iowa:
A homely young woman ventured outside her home to check her mail and came across a manila envelope with no return address. She knew well enough that it was from Walter, judging from the handwriting on the main address.
She shook her head, expecting to open the envelope and find a letter begging her to reconsider, or some jewelry to try and win her back. She went back inside after collecting the rest of the mail. She sat in her and Walter's old favorite cuddling place, now meant for her and her new love.
She opened the envelope and turned it upside down, letting its contents slip out onto her lap. To her surprise, there laid a 45 record broken in two, and a picture of Radar in his formal uniform, in the arms of a beautiful blonde. She flipped the picture over to find simply inscribed: Goodbye.
THE END